Arturo Gonzalez, an attorney representing Uber in a lawsuit filed by Alphabet Inc (NASDAQ:GOOGL) Waymo, has revealed to a federal judge his intention to petition the court with a view to seeking a solution through arbitration. The lawyer also revealed that an agreement on the same had been reached with the employee who formerly worked at Waymo and who features centrally in the case. The employee in question is Anthony Levandowski.
Proprietary trade secrets
Waymo, the driverless car technology unit of Alphabet, filed a lawsuit in February against Uber claiming that its proprietary trade secrets had been stolen by the ride-hailing service company and which it used to rapidly develop an autonomous vehicle program of its own. Google’s autonomous car unit alleges that prior to leaving Waymo, Levandowski downloaded over 14,000 documents containing confidential information on the work the driverless car firm had done on LiDAR – a technology that is key in self-driving car technology. Since Waymo is seeking an injunction to prevent Uber from working on driverless cars, Uber’s intention to seek arbitration on the matter instead of proceeding with a court case could be motivated by the fact that arbitration could enable it reach a speedier conclusion to the matter.
Employment agreement
While appearing before William Alsup, a U.S. District Judge in San Francisco, Gonzalez argued that arbitration should be pursued since in the employment agreement that Levandowski had signed when he joined Waymo, there was a provision that advocated for such. The judge did not, however, seem to agree with him.
“You don’t get many cases where there is pretty direct proof that someone downloaded 14,000 documents and then left the next day. This is a serious proposition,” said Alsup.
Waymo’s and Uber’s litigation calendar is gathering momentum as the latter is slated to issue a response to the complaint on March 27, 2017. Meanwhile, Waymo is slated to make its case on why an injunction should be issued against Uber on April 7, 2017.
On Thursday shares of Alphabet Inc edged up by 0.19% to close the day at $870.00 a share.